


Look The Other Way

by JTHM_Michi



Series: Of Love and Fairness [4]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Gen, Sheriff Stilinski Finds Out, Stilinski Family Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-15
Updated: 2013-08-04
Packaged: 2017-12-20 06:02:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 9,535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/883782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JTHM_Michi/pseuds/JTHM_Michi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The small snippets from my "Of Love and Fairness" verse, including but not limited to: The original confrontation between Stiles and his father over the Sheriff's abandonment of Stiles in the past; A small glimpse of Derek and Stiles' wedding; and a meeting between Lydia and the Sheriff. And really anything else from this verse that I wrote that didn't make it into any of the bigger pieces. It would be better to read the other parts of this verse before this one.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. This is a Tragedy not a Sin

**Author's Note:**

> When I wrote the very first draft of this fic, I had the plan to have the Sheriff find out about the supernatural through Rebecca. That she went off to college, got bit by a rogue Alpha the pack didn’t get rid of in time, and BAM supernatural exists. Originally, there was a scene right before this one where Rebecca had asked her father to meet her at the Starbucks her and Stiles frequent to explain to him that she was now a werewolf. He understandably freaked out but said he still loved her, yada yada. So, she called Stiles over and Stiles told the Sheriff all about what had been going on in Beacon Hills when he was a teenager and the Sheriff was hurt that Stiles had never came to him and blamed all the troubles in BH on Derek and Stiles left in a huff. 
> 
> So, this scene takes place at the end of Rebecca’s semester, just like the confrontation that made it into “We Meet Again”. You might recognize some of the bits because I recycled as much as I could into the final.

“Daddy! I told you to meet me at my dorm.” Rebecca whines, rushing over to hug her father. John hugs her back with one arm, eyes trained on Stiles. 

“I know, pumpkin, but I figured why make you walk all the way back to your dorm when I can drive you back there after your class? I dropped off Sasha and your mom, Casey let them in.” He says, smiling at her with gentle fondness and Stiles remembers that he used to look at his mother like that. 

“Well, in that case, let’s go. We can be home in time for dinner if we leave now.” Rebecca says, pushing against her father to get him to leave. 

“Becca, honey, just… give us a few moments, would ya?” Their father says, looking at Stiles again. He moves around Rebecca, who goes to sit down on a table out of the way. 

“I get that you had to make a lot of hard decisions back then.” John says, jumping right into it. His hands are in his pockets and Stiles swallows around the hope that stupidly wells up inside him. He nods but doesn’t say anything in response. 

“I had to make hard decisions too.” John says quietly. Stiles wants to ask if this is his father’s way of apologizing but is afraid of the answer. 

“I know.” He says instead because he does understand how it looked at the time. 

“Why didn’t you just tell me about all of this when you were 17? Hell, you were 16 when Scott was bit, why didn’t you tell me then?” John asks, running a hand through his hair. 

“I thought I could protect you better if you were in the dark. People were dying and –” Stiles is cut off by the Sheriff seeming to explode with words.

“Yes, people were dying! You let that happen because you didn’t let me know what was really going on in my town! People were dying and you knew who were responsible and you said and did nothing about it. What am I supposed to do with that information, Stiles?” John asks, sounding tired and angry. 

“I let that happen? I did everything I could to stop them, I put myself in danger to protect complete stranger, to protect people who didn’t like me, I didn’t make any of that happen!” Stiles says loudly, before lowering his voice to a more school-friendly level. “How would telling you have helped, no one in the force was a Hunter, none of you would have been able to do a damn thing against an Alpha Pack. Quite frankly, we saved a shit ton of people.” Stiles bites out. He doesn’t say that one of the people they saved, directly, was the Sheriff himself. He wants to but it stays on his tongue, festering there like an open wound. 

“We could have helped.” John says and Stiles shakes his head, because he knows damn well that he couldn’t have helped. “You could have just left it alone. Especially after that night – what was so important that you had to abandon your family?” John continues and Stiles feels like he’s been slapped. 

“What was so – What was – Dad, Scott was in danger. Scott. And more than that, the night Becca got hurt wasn’t the end all, the Druid the Alpha’s had tainted was still out there and I assure you it would have come to kill us all if I hadn’t gone that night. Lydia needed me to help her, to deal with it. I…I can’t believe you’re even asking me what was so important about it, my friends needed me.” Stiles says incredulously. 

“So that was it then – Hale and a bunch of wolves were more important to you than me, than Becca, then your step-mother?” John asks, angry and clearly hurt and when Stiles was younger he would say and do anything to try and make it better. He’d move mountains to make sure his father was never in any emotional pain because of Stiles.

But Stiles isn’t a child anymore and the adult rises to the occasion while the child cries in the background. 

“Hale and a bunch of wolves? Really, that’s what you’re going with – defaulting to seeing them as animals, as if being a werewolf should have made them less important to me than you? Were you even listening when I explained everything to you – I did so much to protect you and your new wife and Rebecca; I did a lot of things that weren’t healthy or safe, but I did them anyway because they kept you safe! How dare you even make the implication that I put someone else above you back then, because even after you kicked me out I did all I could to try and make things easier for you! You were so important to me.” Stiles bites out and he can feel a surge of electricity in his blood, anger igniting his magic and wanting to come out. 

“Well, you certainly had a funny way of showing how much you cared for your old man. Making me and my entire force think you were some sort of serial killer or deranged gang member. And don’t even pretend that you did anything other than choose Hale over me back then, that’s the whole reason I had to kick you out. You were a danger to us and now that I know just how much of a danger you were, I’m only sorry I didn’t do it sooner. You put Hale in front of your family long before Becca almost got killed.” John says, anger making his voice harsh and cutting. 

“Right, because what happened in Beacon Hills was all Derek’s fault, of course. That’s what it comes down to, huh? All of it was Derek. You don’t even realize how full of shit you are, do you?” Stiles asks, feeling a strange sort of loss come over him. 

Rebecca is rocking in place, holding her arms with claws digging into her skin, clearly trying to stay in control and Stiles moved over to her quickly. He can hear John saying something, sounding panicked, but Stiles ignores him and sets his hands on Rebecca’s shoulders. She’s growling and when she looks at him, her eyes are bright yellow. 

He’s reminded more of his son Elessar than one of the betas at that moment and it makes him want to hug her until she stops being so scared. He hums to her, keeping calm so his heart beat is steady to help her calm down and hopes that her father gets the hint to calm down before he has to do anything drastic. He doesn’t think he’ll need to, she’s wolfed out due to stress not anger, so as long as she doesn’t see him as a threat they’ll be fine. 

“You were a danger to the family, Stiles. I didn’t want to do what I did, but you forced my hand. If you had told me the truth, who knows what might have happened?” John says, voice soft and tone wary. Stiles tucks a strand of Rebecca’s hair into place behind her ear as it evens down into a more human shape and her fangs retract. 

This young woman was responsible for his realization that he wanted to be a father. When he had been put in charge of her, it was terrifying. An Alpha Pack that was killing people was stalking his pack and he had been made responsible for a little seven year old girl who didn’t like the peels on grapes and asked Stiles to cut her meat for her. Their parents fell into dating each other and somehow Stiles was the one that ended up having to make dinner for himself and a little girl, he ended up driving her to and from school, and he was the one that helped her with homework. 

It was terrifying and wonderful and he had been in a rage and horrified when she was taken from their house. Taken right out of her bed by Peter fucking Hale and it had started a whole crashing set of events that changed everything in Stiles’ life. 

“I know you still blame me for what I had to do, Stiles. But it was something I needed to do, I had to protect Becca. When you have kids, you’ll understand.” John says from behind him and Stiles pulls away from Rebecca and spins to look at the other man. 

“I’ll understand when I have kids? That’s what you’re going with, really?” Stiles asks incredulously. He thinks about his sons and realizes that they’re never going to have memories of grandparents. “I have kids. I have two sons, both of which I went through hell to get. My first-born almost killed me coming into the world and my youngest almost got me and Allison killed because he made a sound at the wrong time. I would never even suggest to them that either of those events were their fault. I love them, they’re my sons, and I could never abandon them when they needed me. I could never cut them off and then never think on them ever again, never let them back into my life. I love my sons, they’re my children, and they’re everything to me. I’d do anything for them and I’d never let them think they had to protect me. Because I’m their father and protecting them is my job, I get to do that, not them.” Stiles chocks out and he wishes he was angry. Wishes he could cling to his ice and have to concentrate on keeping calm. 

Because he’s not angry right now, right now he’s hurt. The gaping hole that has been open for a little over a decade in his chest is finally cauterizing and it hurts. He wishes he could yell at the old man in front of him, a part of him wants to scream at him for all sorts of things, but Stiles is an adult and such things are beneath him now. 

“I have kids. I have two boys and you will never see them, they will never know your name, and that is your fault, not mine. Maybe you felt you were doing the right thing sending me away that night, kicking me out with nothing but my jeep and a book I had grabbed from my room, but I can’t forgive what you did after that. I tried to call you, to open lines of communication after that and you shut me down every time I tried until I finally got the message and stopped.” Stiles says and he’s shaking. John is red and Stiles can see the vein on his temple pulse and when the Sheriff opens his mouth to shout something, Stiles cuts in before he has a chance. 

“That last time I called you? I was pregnant. Yeah, I was carrying my oldest son inside me and it was killing me! I could have died, it was through sheer stubbornness and dumb luck that I lived through the pregnancy, never mind when they had to cut me open to get him out of me! I called you and I thought I might die soon and you hung up on me!” Stiles is hissing by the end of it, unwilling to scream at the Sheriff. He’s not seventeen anymore, he can’t scream when he’s upset, not anymore. 

“You need to leave.” Stiles says finally, turning to look at Rebecca and see how she’s doing. She’s standing, all her things gathered, and her eyes are glowing but she’s not wolfed out any beyond that. She’s hunched in on herself and she’s moved closer to the door, which is still on Stiles’ side of the room. Her body language is telling him worrying things about her allegiances, but maybe it’s for the better. Her wolf clearly wants to protect her father but she isn’t attacking him, her control is remarkably good. 

He turns to look at the Sheriff and he feels his face shift into the mask he wears when he has to deal with people who want to kill members of his pack – that calm, dangerous expression that makes Lydia giggle in delight and turns his insides cold. He never thought he’d use it on this man, but life is funny that way. 

The Sheriff leaves with his tail tucked between his legs and Stiles is so happy that Rebecca’s class was his last one because he really wants to curl up in Derek’s arms and sob his eyes out. This is it, he’s really, finally done it: He’s lost his father, once and for all. Forever.


	2. Cloudy Crystal Ball

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is about wedding invitations and fond memories of a wonderful event. Less cryptic, this is a scene from before We Meet Again where Stiles and Elessar looking over Derek and Stiles' wedding album. Its short and kinda bitter.

He’s hunting in the linen closet for the Christmas lights when he stumbles upon his Wedding Album. (He says “stumbles” but it was more like it fell right on top of his head as he was pulling the clear box with lights down from its snug place within the closet. To-ma-to, to-mah-do.) The album had been one of his baby shower gifts, from Boyd, and he and Derek pretty much let the pack fill the thing up for them. Neither one of them were very much into things like this – they had the entire ceremony taped and most everyone they loved was in attendance, so they left the album compiling to the rest of their family. 

Which is probably why the damn thing has been missing since their wedding, come to think of it. Stiles tucks the album under his arm and kicks the door closed, clear container holding Christmas lights held against his side as he moved back into the living room. Elessar is on his stomach on the floor in front of Castiel, helping his brother stack blocks and talking quietly to the baby. He sets the box, with the album atop it, next to the couch, out of the way, and goes to play with his sons. 

About an hour later, Stiles gently picks Castiel up, careful not to wake him up with the jostling, and takes him to be tucked in. His baby boy immediately grabs onto his teddy bear when he’s put into his crib and Stiles leans down to give him a little kiss before he leaves the room, door propped open just a smidge. Elessar is sitting on the couch with the wedding album open on his lap when he gets back into the living room. 

Stiles sits down next to the little boy – “I’m seven now, Dad, I’m not a little boy anymore!” – and watches as he looks over photo after photo of Stiles and Derek’s wedding and the reception afterwards. The album book itself is beautiful, the pages a nice pale gold with white trim at the edges, and none of the more popular built in captions that so many wedding albums have now. 

“That’s you.” Stiles says, pointing at the little baby version of Elessar in a photo, perched on Derek’s hip as Stiles cuts their wedding cake next to them. The baby was in a truly adorable baby tuxedo and was hiding his face in Derek’s neck. “You and Vicky were doing so good, we were all rather impressed that neither of you had thrown a fit since that was the most people you both had been around at that point in your lives, and then it came time for speeches to be had and right as Uncle Isaac was coming up – Uncle Scott had just finished his speech and was back with Vicky and Aunt Allison – you just started throwing a fit! You were so cute.” Stiles gushed, wrapping an arm around his son who immediately started whining that he wasn’t a baby and babies crying was not in any form or fashion cute. 

Stiles and Derek had gotten married four months after Elessar had been born, which put Stiles at twenty-one and Derek at twenty-eight and Stiles had been deliriously happy. He was still physically recovering from the cesarean section he had underwent to get Elessar out of him – and hadn’t that been a perfectly terrifying experience he would never in a million years tell his son about – and thus when Elessar had started kicking up a fuss he almost burst into tears himself. Derek gently took the baby from him, easily able to calm him down using “mystic werewolf mojo” as Stiles called it, and they were all able to go on with the reception. Stiles remembers that he was still channeling a bit of anxiousness towards Elessar at that time. He got over it, thankfully, but there were certainly a few moments when the pack had to virtually kidnap him to get him to have some much needed alone time. 

“Who’s that?” Elessar asked a few pages later, pointing to a picture of Stiles dancing with the former Alpha of Modesto.

“That’s Stephanie Wargner, she was the Alpha of the pack in Modesto. You remember how when Castiel came to us, he smelt different?” Stiles asked combing a hand through Elessar’s hair as the little boy furrowed his brow in thought. He nodded after a few moments, looking back up at Stiles. “Well, that’s because he came from another pack. The pack he came from had gotten in trouble with Stephanie’s pack and she was badly hurt by Castiel’s old pack so she let us keep Castiel. So now Castiel is a part of our pack and not hers.” Stiles explained. Elessar furrowed his brow again and Stiles thought he looked an awful lot like Derek when he was trying to remember street names. It was endearing. 

“How comes she’s dancing with you?” Elessar asked eventually, nose wrinkled up. Stiles chuckled before answering. 

“We were friends. Aunt Lydia and Aunt Erica danced with me too.” Stiles pointed out, turning the pages until he found a photo of him and Lydia dancing. He’ll never forget that dance, if only because it was such a disaster. Neither of them could dance to save their lives and eventually they just lost the plot of the song and did their own thing. It was fun at least and he’s glad the photo someone snapped of them makes them look much more graceful then they actually were. Erica was a much better dancer than he was, so when he danced with her he just let her lead and that was just as fun. 

Elessar turned the pages, looking over photos of his family at his parents wedding, and eventually he came to the last page – the wedding invitations. Isaac had bulldozed his way over them and did most of the planning for their wedding – he chose the location and the date and the colors and almost did everything. But the wedding invites had been all Derek and Stiles – simple light blue invitations with white corner patterns, all relevant information on the front. They also chose to do the invitations by name, the old fashioned “Mr/Mrs so-and-so is invited…” because Derek remembered that his parents had done it that way and Stiles had liked the thought. They chose the light blue because they had a baby already so it didn’t seem like a bad idea to do something other than black and white. 

“Who’s Laura?” Elessar asks, looking at the invitation which reads ‘Ms. Laura Hale is invited to the marriage…’ Stiles ruffles Elessar’s hair before answering. 

“Laura was your daddy’s sister. She died a long time ago but I thought that your daddy would appreciate me inviting her anyway.” He said and his son hummed, closing the album gently. 

When the wedding invitations had come in the mail, Stiles let Derek find the ones for Laura and his parents, sitting next to him at the kitchen table, baby Elessar on his lap. Stiles had to look up the names of Derek’s parents – Talia Hale and Richard Hale – and he’s glad he made the decision to invite them, even if only in spirit. Derek hadn’t cried when he saw them, just sat quietly before he shuffled through the remaining invitations and handed him the one he had made for Stiles’ dad. Never let it be said that they didn’t think alike in some things. 

“Was she pretty like my other Aunties?” Elessar asked, looking up at him.

“Yes, she had dark hair like your daddy and Aunt Allison.” Stiles says and its really very sad that he doesn’t know that much else about Laura Hale. Derek may not be openly bleeding about the death of his sister anymore but that doesn’t mean he talks about her, or the rest of their family, very much. Stiles knows very little of Derek’s sister – knows she was going to be a lawyer and had been going to NYU before going back to Beacon Hills. Derek had told him, before Elessar, before Oakdale, that Laura would have liked Stiles and Scott. 

“Now, how would you like a grilled cheese sandwich? And then we can start decorating the living room.” Stiles said, kissing his son’s head and getting up from the couch. Elessar cheered and rushed off into the kitchen while Stiles placed the wedding album atop the Christmas lights box again and followed after. 

[He sent the invitation to his father. He didn’t get a response and to this day that still alternately hurts and makes him angry. It won’t be until a few days after the confrontation with his father, the moment when he realizes that he’s lost his father forever but somehow still has Rebecca, that he realizes that his father didn’t even know he and Derek got married. He likes to think that maybe the invitation just got swallowed by a post office somewhere but a darker part of him, the part that is boiling water and feels vaguely like Lydia, tells him that his father probably saw his name on the envelope and just threw it out. He’ll never know which is correct.]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I made the wedding invitations for this fic, using basic invite, so [my tumblr](http://themoosejthm.tumblr.com/post/56530981343/themoosejthm-this-is-what-the-final-wedding) has the invite up on it, along with [two](http://themoosejthm.tumblr.com/post/56531046717/this-is-another-version-of-what-the-wedding) [others](http://themoosejthm.tumblr.com/post/56531013294/this-is-one-of-the-wedding-invites-that-i-designed)


	3. To Say Something Of Nothing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Takes place after Magic Musings. The Sheriff comes to pay Dr. Martin a visit at her place of work and surprisingly no one dies or gets set on fire. This particular part of the story will also never get a continuation I'm afraid, so I'm sorry in advance. (also it's short, so I'm sorry for that as well.)

She’s crunching numbers into the computer, feeding data into it and saving it all in separate places when the one of the interns taps on her shoulder. 

“Dr. Martin? Uhm…there’s a…well, I mean…there’s a cop here, downstairs. For you.” The intern – Brianna, still getting her degree and not very confident in herself – says to her, wringing her fingers and looking more anxious than usual. 

“From the Oakdale P.D.?” Lydia asks even though she has a sinking sensation that its not one of them. Brianna shakes her head and Lydia thanks the girl and turns back to her computer, making sure that all her data is saved and nothing got caught up. 

She tells Martin, the longest lasting intern she’s had, to call her husband and inform him that a police officer wishes to speak to her. He nods at her, eyes a little wide, and Lydia gives him a sharp smile before finally going downstairs to attend to the officer waiting for her. 

She wants to say that she’s surprised when she sees its Sheriff Stilinski standing in the lobby but she’s really, really not. She’s a little annoyed but not shocked. 

“I was told you wanted to speak to me, Officer?” Lydia asks, coming to a stop in front of him, planting her feet and looking him in the eye. The last time he spoke with her in an official capacity, she was a teenager in a hospital gown seated in a bed and one of his officers had her handcuffed to her bed for over twelve hours. 

“Ms. Martin, I’d like to talk to you about your recent visit to Beacon Hills if that’s at all possible.” He says, talking down to her in a way that makes fire cackle inside her belly and she feels a tangle of her magic reach for Stiles. 

“Dr. Martin, Officer, please stop disrespecting me by insisting on calling me Ms. I’m not a Ms., I have a doctorate, please respect that or at least attempt it.” Lydia says sharply. 

“You and your associates entered Beacon Hills on Friday evening, is this correct?” He asks after grinding his teeth and not addressing her title. She stays quiet, staring him down until he shifts his gaze from her eyes to her chin. 

“Ms. Martin, please answer the question or I’ll be forced arrest you for obstruction.” He says and his expression turns a little smug at his words. She wants to hit him. More than that, she wants to laugh as he screams. 

“Sheriff, you’re a little too out of your jurisdiction for threats like that. Also, Dr. Martin has been perfectly compliant and polite so the least you could do is address her by her correct title.” Jackson says from behind the Sheriff, voice hard and unfriendly. The Sheriff turns sharply, hand going to his hip, and Lydia steps closer to her husband, letting Jackson place himself a hairbreadths in front of her to appease his instincts. 

And if her magic twists around her fingers and the lights flicker, that can hardly be helped. The Sheriff’s hand strays away from his holster and Jackson lets his shoulders relax. 

“I’m not threatening your wife, I’m stating facts. I’m here under official business and she’s refusing to cooperate thus interfering with my investigation.” The Sheriff says, crossing his arms and staring at Jackson in what would have been an intimidating stare if he wasn’t looking at a werewolf who used to be a killer lizard. 

“Well, I’m sure Dr. Martin would be more than happy to accompany you to the Oakdale Police Station for questioning, we could easily have our lawyer meet us there.” Jackson says and she can’t see his face but can hear his smug expression. The lights flicker again and her blood is singing with the want to rip the electricity out of the building and make the Sheriff arch and scream with it. She keeps her mouth shut tight, teeth clenched together, and holds her magic at bay. 

“The day your little group came into town, we found a dead body in the woods.” The Sheriff says, as if that’s supposed to mean something to them. 

“And that means what, exactly? That a body happened to be found during a well-publicized and known public event that would naturally draw people from around the country back to their hometown for a high school reunion? If that’s all you’ve got, we’re done here.” Jackson says, taking her hand and starting for the exit. His hand feels cold to her touch, which means she might be burning his skin but she’s so angry she can’t tone it down. 

“That’s not all we’ve got and I didn’t say you were free to leave.” The Sheriff says from behind them and Lydia lets go of Jackson’s hand to pivot around to face him. 

“You also haven’t arrested either of us, so we’re free to go whenever we please, I’m not a teenager handcuffed to a bed this time around, Sheriff, and I know my rights. We’re leaving and I’d appreciate it if you stop harassing me and my family.” She says sweetly before taking a step forward, letting the lights overhead flicker dangerously. “And furthermore, I’d appreciate it if you stop acting like your harassment has anything to do with police work and stay away from Stiles and his place of employment. He’s finally happy and has stopped blaming himself for your abandonment so if you could leave my family alone, I’d really appreciate it.” She continues and turns to leave with her husband. Her purse and notes are still in her locker upstairs but she can leave them there until tomorrow as her access-pass is still clipped onto her hip and that’s really the only thing she needs to get into the building. 

“I know you have something to do with that body and when I find the evidence, I’m going to bury you in it.” The Sheriff calls after them and neither of them respond.


	4. Family Is Not Blood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Victoria gets into a fight at school and it leads to Erica thinking about parents, more specifically the parents of the now adult members of her pack. Melissa is the only grandparent the kids in the pack have, why is that?

Erica is at work when she gets a call from Victoria and Elessar’s school kindly asking her if she is available to pick Victoria up because she’s been sent home on grounds of fighting and her parents are caught up elsewhere. She asks the man on the other end of the line to repeat himself and when it is confirmed that, yes, her niece are being sent home for the day due to _fighting_ she holds the receiver away from her mouth to laugh long and hard about it. When she informs the man that she’ll be right there he has the gall to almost lecture her about “appropriate responses to disciplinary actions”. Oh, she hopes for his sake he isn’t there when she picks the children up because she might deck him. (And she knows they’ll be together because they’re just like the new Stiles-and-Scott. You’d never guess they weren’t actually brother and sister from looking at them.)

The munchkins are seated in the front office and Victoria has what looks like the beginnings of a truly impressive (for an eight year old anyway) bruise on her cheek while Elessar shakes next to her. It’s a shaking she’s very familiar with, the shaking that foretells claws and fangs and howling at the moon, and she takes a moment to kneel down to set a hand atop his head to calm him. She feels the pack bond between them like a phantom sensation of feathers and string and tugs on it, taking the agitation from the little boy. Elessar stops shaking gradually and kinda oozes sideways onto Victoria and it’s the cutest thing Erica has ever seen.

By the time she stands up, the Principal – a stern little old Asian lady that comes up to Erica’s shoulders but still looks like she could win in a fist fight – is standing nearby with the patented Authority Figure Disproves Of Everything You Are frown upon her face. Erica may or may not stand there like a deer in the headlights.

“Mrs. Reyes, yes?” She says with a hint of an accent.

“Just Ms. Actually. Do I need to sign anything to get them out of here?” Erica asks, going for her charming ‘You should totally buy this car from me because I am trustworthy’ smile.

“Them?” The Principal asks without inflection and Erica mentally groans.

“Yeah, Vicky and Elessar. I’m listed on both of their forms as an Emergency Contact and I know Elessar won’t be able to concentrate the rest of the day, I’d just like to take both of them home.” Erica says and hopes her smile is still in place because she is super bad at authority figures, especially Principals, and has been ever since her middle school Principal said ‘it was in poor taste yes but they didn’t cause any harm, did they?’ in response to her mother trying to get some form of punishment for the assholes who taped her seizing once.

The Principal stared her down for a few more moments and Erica was just about to open her mouth and probably put her foot in it when the older woman grabbed a clipboard and held it out for her.

“Just sign them both out and tell the McCall’s to expect a phone call from the school sometime later tonight, perhaps around five o’clock.” The Principal said and Erica eagerly signed the sheet and was soon helping Elessar and Victoria into the backseat of her car.

“Are we going home?” Victoria asked as Erica turned out of the school parking lot.

“I’m taking you to my place, your mom and dad will come grab you when they’re done at work. Right now they’re both in surgery – one of the dogs is having a difficult labor, or so I’m told so they couldn’t come get you. And when we get to my house, I'll call Stiles and Derek to tell them I've got Elessar so they don't freak out.” Erica explained to the munchkins. 

“Do you guys want stuffed peppers for lunch?” Erica asked, looking in the rearview mirror briefly. Elessar was out like a light and Victoria shrugged her shoulders in reply to Erica’s question. Erica turned her attention back to the road and figured she’d have to play ‘Awesome Auntie Erica’ to get Victoria out of her sulking.

Erica, Boyd, and Isaac lived together in a two bedroom bungalow with a beautiful sitting nook at the front and a nice two car garage off to the side. They had gotten the house at such a discounted price it was a near steal but, unlike Stiles and Derek’s house or Scott and Allison’s house, it wasn't becasue the little bungalow was heavily haunted. It had been used as a meth lab and two people had been shot in the house. When they got the house the smell was horrible (for them, Stiles and Allison didn’t have any problem and Lydia didn’t get to see the house before all the remodeling) and there was a wall with a massive hole in a front wall that separated the kitchen and what was the living room. Instead of trying to fix the hole they just decided to knock the wall down and make the living room into a sitting nook and put in some skylights and it was Erica’s favorite room in the house.

(Oh and the fun they had cleaning up the neighborhood was delightful. When they got it their nieghborhood was known as "gang lane" unoffically so it had been fun to utterly rearrange the entire feel of the place. Many drug dealers and gang members fled the area due to "animal attacks". They didn't kill anyone but they certainly put the fear of God, or at least werewolves, into a great many a person. But that's a story for another time.)

Erica pulled into her driveway, clicked the garage door open, and noticed that Isaac and Boyd must still be out because Isaac’s car wasn’t in its spot. Elessar jerked awake once Erica closed her car door and opened his and he looked around sleepily before tumbling out of the car. Erica snickered at him, ruffling his hair as he passed, and waved Victoria into the house.

Elessar eagerly helped with the preparation of the stuffed peppers while Victoria dumped her backpack out onto the kitchen table and sat down to do her homework. Lunchtime was going to be fun if Victoria was in such a funk she was willingly doing her homework, Erica could tell.

“So…fighting, huh?” Erica opened with, once the food was ready and Victoria had managed to do all of her homework. (And, considering how she worked straight through both the cooking and preparation of the food, Erica suspects she might have done both her own and Elessar’s homework. Ah the memories of elementary school level homework.)

Victoria clenched her jaw and Elessar hunched in on himself. Erica sighed to herself and shoved more food into her mouth, thinking over how to get both of them to talk to her. There is a reason she is an Aunt and not a Mother and this is the reason – she’s not good with kids and honestly that doesn’t bother her at all. She has all the children she wants through Victoria, Elessar, and Castiel and she’s quite happy with her family.

“Who was my dad’s surrogate?” Elessar asks out of the blue, half shouting his question at her. Erica stares at him in confused horror before turning to Victoria, who has reached across the table to swat Elessar on the head.  

“What?” Erica chokes out. Victoria gives a huge sigh and sits up in her chair, adopting what Erica mentally calls her ‘Looking Like Mommy’ posture – she lifts her chin up and straightens her back while placing her hands on the table in front of her. When she does this she really does look like a miniature Allison, ready to whip out a knife and cut someone, its adorable.

“What Elessar means to say is that we learned recently that two dads cannot have a baby without a mommy or a surrogate, which is like a substitute mommy, so we figured we should know who his substitute mommy was. He deserves to know.” She says calmly using her ‘I’m a big girl’ voice. Erica blinked at them and seriously considered telling them to just talk to Stiles and Derek about this but…

They asked her and she’s right there and has a policy about not lying to the kids. If they’re old enough to ask the question, they’re old enough for an age-friendly response. With that in mind, she settles into her seat and gives them both a very serious look.

“There was no surrogate. Elessar is special in that he really does just have two fathers and no mother. There was a spell placed on Stiles and the result was Elessar; this is just like the werewolf secret – it’s not to be mentioned to anyone that’s not pack, do you understand?” Erica asked, looking at them both. They both nodded seriously. “Now, if you want more information, Elessar, your fathers would be more than happy to tell you all about it.” Erica continued, reaching out to fluff the boy’s hair. He ducked his head, tips of his ears red, and Erica turned back to Victoria.

“Do you want to tell me what caused you to get into a fight today? It wasn’t about this, was it?” Erica asked. Victoria shrugged and fidgeted in place for a few moments before looking back up at Erica.

“Paige was saying that Elessar’s surrogate was probably ugly like he is and when I told her to leave him alone she said some other stuff and I hit her. Then she hit me back and Elessar almost...well, I just hit her again until she started to cry and then teachers seperated us.” Victoria said and Erica sighed.

“Thank you for telling me. I’ll tell your mother and she’ll figure out what to do with you, okay?” Erica asked and Victoria nodded looking sullen again. Erica smiled at the little girl and got up from the table, gathering all the dishes to place into the sink and deal with later.

“Auntie Erica, what was your mommy like?” Elessar asks, voice innocent and curious. The question makes Erica pause because she hasn’t thought about her mother or her father for years.

“She was,” _selfish, horrible, scared, a coward, distant and cold_ “sad.” She settled on, turning back to the children. “Her life didn’t turn out the way she thought it would and it made her very sad and a little scared. I didn’t know her, not really.” Erica says. Victoria frowns at her and Elessar opens his mouth to question her further when the front door opened.

"Erica, you here yet? The school called me and said you took Elessar home?" Stiles calls out, coming around the corner with Castiel near asleep in his arms. 

Elessar scrambles out of his seat to run to his dad while Victoria stays at the table, drinking her juice. Erica smiles at the girl, who grins back at her and Erica gets back up to get the little girl an ice pack for her face. Scott will throw a fit when he sees her and call the other kid’s parents no doubt while Allison will probably sigh, lecture the girl, and then teach her how to avoid getting hit next time.

It’s not until later that night, after the munchkins have been bundled back to their respective homes, that she thinks about it. She’s settled next to Boyd in bed, wrapped around him, and the innocent question _what was your mommy like_ comes to her mind and won’t go away.Its been a long time since Erica even bothered to think of her mother.

Before she had taken the bite, her parents were just these people who were stuck with her, stuck taking care of her, and she knew they resented her. Her parents divorced when she was much younger and her father had been this kind of mirage for her, this man that appeared when she was in the hospital or going through treatments and then left once it was time to go home. She didn’t feel much of anything for the man, he was just some guy that sometimes sent her money and stood next to her when doctors spoke jargon at her. But her mother…

Erica really had loved her mother as a child. The woman had been someone that soothed her when she was scared and Erica wanted to be just like her as a child. The woman had been tall and beautiful with thick hair and she walked with purpose. Erica had thought she was so brave and noble to still take care of her, to still care about her, to spend so much money on treatment options, to still love her. It wasn’t until Erica had a pack, had someone get electrocuted trying to free her from restraints, had someone that searched and searched for four months for her, until she had people that loved her that she realized how very unhealthy her relationship with her mother was.

Boyd shifts in sleep, turning to bury his face in her throat and she can’t stop the contented rumble that comes out from deep in her chest. She rolls her eyes at herself a little and tightens her grip on him. He left his family in Beacon Hills, sat them down once he was free of the Alpha Pack and told them he was leaving them. Of course, he was never very close to his family, they had a very hands-off approach to raising him; so he hadn’t found it difficult to leave them especially since he had the pack.

The pack is family, love, belonging, and she’d much rather have it than her mother.

* * *

 

So what were the other parents of the pack doing during the time when the Alpha Pack was around and the Beacon Hills Police Department was suspecting the pack of being involved in all this fuckery?

  * Allison lost her father the night Rebecca was rescued, remember Peter lost the plot and beheaded him? Because of that, and the fact that Allison was 18 by that point anyway, the BHPD treated her as an adult and she pretty much owned them legally. She didn’t so much as breath in their presence without an Argent Lawyer next to her. It wasn’t until she moved out of Beacon Hills and into a house with Scott in Oakdale that the Argent Clan, the larger part that her family was a part of, disowned her officially. But by that time she didn’t need a near army of legal representatives to shadow her movements to make sure she wasn’t arrested or tried on bullshit.
  * The BHPD were actually trying to get Isaac into a foster family since his father had died but that stopped once they began to suspect him. He was 17 but the BHPD really didn’t give a shit and if not for Allison sharing her lawyers with him the BHPD would have gotten away with shit like trying to treat him as an adult when he was a minor. In this case that means they tried to hold him overnight once without anyone there to protect his rights, claiming that since his parents were dead they didn’t have to inform anyone of his arrest. In walks one of the Argent Lawyers and a really pissed off child services rep. Isaac was declared an emancipated minor shortly thereafter
  * When Lydia was held overnight and Stiles got hurt because of that, you remember that moment in “Magic Musings” when Lydia says Stiles got the skin on one of his arms ripped off? Yeah, that night? Lydia’s mother stormed the station with some lawyers, one of which was Jackson’s father, got Lydia out of holding and sued the BHPD. (they settled out of court and that money was how Lydia and Jackson were able to have an apartment while Lydia was attending MIT.) And when Lydia was handcuffed to a hospital bed the night Rebecca was rescued, her father slapped a restraining order onto Officer Anderson, as he was both the officer that originally held her overnight and handcuffed her to a hospital bed. Officer Anderson was later dismissed from his position due to an outcry over his treatment of Lydia and the restraining order she had against him. Many people didn’t like the very unsettling and near sexualized fixation he had towards the “sweet, traumatized 17 year old child”. (Turns out one of the nurses took a photo of Lydia handcuffed to her bed and it went viral – especially once Stiles was awake and got his hands on a phone with an internet connection.) Lydia’s mother was later murdered in her own living room, presumably by the thing that sucked magic from Lydia and Stiles during the rescue of Rebecca. Lydia has no idea what happened to her father, just that he vanished.
  * Jackson’s parents took the BHPD to trial for various civil rights violations – mostly against minors – and won the court case during Jackson’s junior year in college. The money awarded to them they gave to Jackson and Lydia as an early marriage gift – the two didn’t get married until Lydia had her Ph.D which wasn’t until a few years after that – and they haven’t spoken to Jackson since. They packed up their house in Beacon Hills and moved shortly after the trial was won and didn’t leave Jackson a forwarding address. He doesn’t care.
  * Stiles getting kicked out destroyed Melissa and John’s relationship. They had been friends since college, Melissa introduced John to his first wife, and they both had been devastated when she died. Melissa sometimes thinks that if she had just sat John down and told him what was going on, explained things before people started dying in such large numbers, that things would have been easier. Melissa also wasn’t about to allow anyone to just arrest her son for no reason and she lost a great deal of friends, especially since most of them were in the BHPD. A part of her, a bitter part that sometimes sounds like Stiles’ mother, hopes that one day when she’s watching Elessar, Victoria, and Castiel that John will come by and see them. She hopes he’ll see that Elessar is clearly his grandson and she hopes it’ll hurt him. (You’d have to be blind not to see his resemblance to both Stiles and his mother. Sure, he has Derek’s coloring and is a werewolf, but just looking at him…he looks so much like Stiles sometimes it’s astonishing.) But since she’s an adult she ignores that bitter part and mostly just doesn’t think about him anymore. Losing John was hard on her, hurt like a death, but she has her sons and their spouses and her grandchildren and she deals just fine.




	5. And the Ending Creeps Up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And this is it, this is all she wrote! A few more little bits from their lives and then that's it. Feel free to ask me questions about this verse in the comments or on my [tumblr!](http://themoosejthm.tumblr.com)

Scott and Allison get married first. They’re five months pregnant (And that will seriously _never not be funny_ because really you guys, really?) and Allison looks beautiful and Scott looks ecstatic and the entire ceremony is full of enough love to choke on it.

 They don’t get married because they get pregnant, they get married because Allison got her degree at the JC near Beacon Hills and they bought the house in Oakdale together. The house in Oakdale is _theirs_ , they bought it without any outside help and one night Allison looks over at Scott hunched over his books with his tongue peeking out from between his lips and she loves him so much she physically feels about ready to burst. They get married because Allison happened to pass by the same jewelry store five times before she finally marched in, face red, and looked at all the wedding rings they had. They get married because Allison repeated that song and dance, that same embarrassing song and dance where people ask her if she is sure she’s looking for _wedding bands_ and not _engagement ones_ , five more times on different jewelry stores before she found the perfect set for them. They get married because Allison called Lydia at stupid o’clock one night, roaring drunk while Scott and some of the other betas were investigating a strange string of “suicides” saying that she was going to ask Scott to marry her and Lydia had to talk her out of it because they were twenty-one and twenty respectively and marriage at that age was literally insanity. They get married because Lydia is a horrible, dirty traitor and instead of talking Allison out of it she coached her on how to argue the price down for the rings Allison wanted.

 They get married because when even the price gets argued down to something halfway decent Allison still can’t afford the down payment and she ends up on Derek and Stiles’ porch crying because she really wanted those rings and she can’t afford them and what is she going to do, Stiles, what is she going to do, those were the perfect rings for them and what if someone else buys them? They get married because Derek, the horrible Alpha he is, loans Allison the rest of the down payment money for the rings instead of telling her she’s being ridiculous. They get married because Allison doesn’t bother hiding the damn things, just sets them in her jewelry box and then asks Scott to grab her a bracelet from it on date night a few nights later and when Scott brings them in with a strange expression on his face she panics and ends up shouting “I WANT TO MARRY YOU” at him. They get married because Scott blindly sets the box down on the hallway table and all but tackles her against the wall, saying yes in every combination he can think of, and they don’t manage to make it to the movie they were going to do to.

 (And no, that is not the night Victoria is conceived. It could have been, but Allison was actually already pregnant at that point.)

 They get married because they’re in love and they’re tired of waiting. They get married because Allison once begged her father not to shoot Scott, swore she wouldn’t see him anymore, and saw him anyway. They get married because there was a time when Scott really thought he would give in to Peter’s call, that he could change and kill someone, and it was her heartbeat that broke him out of it. They get married because Allison once leapt atop a Hunter’s back and drove a knife into his spleen because he was pointing a gun at Scott, standing over him grinning because Scott was already littered with bullets and succumbing to aconite poisoning. They get married because Scott once threw himself on top of her, yelling at her to stay under him because he could take a bullet and she couldn’t.

 They do not get married because they got pregnant.

* * *

Allison gets married when she’s five months pregnant and it’s one of the happiest days of her life. She chose to take his last name because her name is attached to death and destruction and genocide. She chooses to become a McCall because she’s pregnant with a child that will be part of a wolf pack, human or not, and she doesn’t want to be an Argent, not with the knowledge of how many children just like that her family has killed. Kate was hardly the only Argent in the history of hunting that slaughtered entire packs of werewolves after all. She casts aside the Argent name because she’s already been disowned by the larger clan and that name is why both her mother and her father were killed. She casts it aside and when she does she feels a lightness she hasn’t felt in years descend upon her and she hadn’t even known her last name was a weight.

 Her wedding takes place outside and the ceremony starts just as the sun is at the horizon. There is no one to walk her down the aisle but she feels her father’s hand at her back anyway and she saw her mother, happy with tears in her eyes, out of the corner of her eye sitting next to Melissa. She says her vows to Scott and thinks she hears Kate give a whoop at the end of them, the same one her aunt used to give when Allison won archery awards. She kisses Scott right as the last bit of light shines and when she opens her eyes and pulls away, the sun has gone down and the stars have come out and people are cheering and clapping.

 They’re five months pregnant and its one of the happiest days of their lives.

* * *

 Stiles takes a semester off school off when it becomes too hard to hide how he’s growing. There’s a doctor who also happens to be a rather powerful witch that gets called in, to examine Stiles and the baby, be there for if anything goes wrong. The pregnancy lasted for almost 12 months, almost a full year, and the last stretch is terrifying.

 Elessar is cut out of Stiles and he’s a little small for a newborn but not dangerously so. Stiles’ heartbeat is erratic and too weak and even the humans can smell something rotting. Between the spell and the fact that Stiles’ body wasn’t designed to hold a baby its not a simple matter of stitching him back up and calling it a day. Lydia ends up burning away a lot of rotting tissue from inside Stiles, cleansing his organs, and at one point she throws everyone out of the room and not even the wolves know what she did. Elessar cries the entire time from Derek’s arms, loud cries that sound pitiful, and they get louder as time passes. Derek’s trying to calm the baby down but since they’re all in a state of low-grade panic it doesn’t seem to work all that well. They’re all thankful that Melissa is visiting and babysitting Victoria back at Allison and Scott’s.

 But finally, Lydia allows them back into the room and the doctor stitches Stiles up and it looks like things are out of the danger zone. Stiles makes grabby hands towards Elessar and when the baby is settled into his arms he quiets and stares up into Stiles’ face. Derek sits down nearby and the pack is around them and Stiles asks someone to get Melissa and Victoria so they can meet the newest member of the family.

 And if Stiles cried when Melissa cooed at the baby and called herself “Grandma Melissa” there was no shame in it.

* * *

Lydia never calls her kanima “Peter”. Never. Peter Hale is dead and she has a pet but her kanima _is not Peter Hale_. Whatever made Peter Hale himself was burned away with his pack and his house; he never woke up from his coma. Her kanmia is a pet not a person, not even a sentient being. She’s made sure of that and she refuses to feel guilty over it – her pet gave her the means to do it, gave her the tether she needed, and she took that opportunity. He’s little more than a particularly interesting tattoo or piece of jewelry when Lydia needs him nearby otherwise he’s a lizard that stays in his den ready to be called.

 She uses him rarely and only when the pack has come to an agreement over it. She used him on a pair of Hunters that got away from them, up and left their territory after destroying a nearby pack, and her pet brought her their eyes. She used him on a rogue Alpha and her kanima brought her its pelt. She’s attached to her pet in the same way someone is to their dog or cat but that’s the extent of it. She figures there’s something unhealthy about that but she deals with it the best she can and moves on with her life.

* * *

  Lydia and Jackson get married last. (And it is last because Erica and Boyd aren’t the marrying type and Isaac…well, that situation is a little complicated.) It’s the smallest wedding any of them had, just the pack there, and its tasteful and classic. Jackson takes Lydia’s name because why not? You’d never know it from looking at them but they’re both ridiculously happy and content with their lives and their careers. They have their family all around them and they’re happy. The ceremony is simple and short and to the point. The reception takes place at Lydia and Jackson’s new house and Lydia gets roped into a tea party with Victoria and Elessar – since she’s still in her wedding gown she gets a plastic tiara and she looks not as silly as she probably should.

 Its not traditional but its there’s and it works. This is their lives and they’re happy. Ultimately, they’re happy.


End file.
